Alright, I don't want to offend people who loved this book and it feel like it changed their life 4eva, but this book is pretty ridic. I've noticed that there's a pretty strong correlation between how glossy and ornamented with background images and decorational GIFs a book is and how much bullshit is inside. This book is no exception.

It starts off pretty innocuously. "Think positively, be a happier person." If that were the entire message of the book then I think I'd give it a 3-5 star rating. Where the book goes wrong is when it doesn't just strongly suggest that bad things that happen to you are always your fault, it guarantees it. That car accident you were in? The fact that your parents divorced when you were a young age? Anything sucky that's happened in your life that you *thought* was beyond your control? All of it was your fault because you were thinking bad thoughts. Yes, it even goes as far as to say that EVERYONE INVOLVED IN THE HOLOCAUST DESERVED IT. I really wish that I was making this part up as some kind of extreme extension of the author's line of thought, but she explicitly states this.

The danger of this book is that it repeatedly advises its readers to essentially *pray* for good things to happen. Byrne and her group of "teachers" advise you to imagine the result of good things as if they've already happened while strongly discouraging you to avoid thinking about the means by which they are accomplished. She's telling you to just wish really really really hard that good stuff has happened to you, and then it will. Because "The UnIvErSe" hears your message and will hitcha back, yo.

The high-point of lulz was when the author stipulated that anyone who was overweight and unhappy about it was so because they thought too many "fat thoughts." SERIOUSLY. Fat thoughts!! Hey Rhonda, maybe it was the CAKE?

It seems like people who would be drawn to this are the type of people who would prefer to believe in magic (religion falls under this category) rather than face reality. Fortunately part of reality is that having a good attitude and outlook will make you and everyone around you happier. But avoiding thinking about the process by which you could achieve great things robs an individual of the satisfaction of having achieved something on their own- not just by wishing rlyrlyrlyrly hard.

Edit: The only weird thing is...whenever I want a parking spot now, if I use "the secret" I almost always get one...Weird. (for that I'm updating this book from 1 star to 2)

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